Tony Lloyd calls on Foreign Secretary to act on ‘genocide’ in Burma

Tony Lloyd MP

Tony Lloyd MP has spoken out about the longstanding persecution of a minority Muslim group living in majority Buddhist Burma.

The plight of the Rohingya - who make up 1.1 million of the South East Asian country’s 53 million population, but who are not recognised as full citizens - has been a hot topic in Parliament this week, following an upsurge in violence perpetrated by the Burmese army against the minority group.

Speaking about the tragedy in Parliament, Mr Lloyd urged the UK government to condemn the inaction of the Burmese state in the strongest possible terms.

Mr Lloyd said: "When the Minister has finally clarified the facts, will he condemn as genocide what everybody else believes to be genocide? What is the value of having a democratic dialogue if the result is the persecution and massacre of a whole group of people?"

Many Rohingya say that Burmese government security forces have torched their villages and killed civilians. Since 25 August, over 100,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled their homes: huge numbers have crossed the border to Bangladesh, where refugee camps are full, and tens of thousands are trapped on hillsides without access to food, water or medicine.

Burma’s State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi has so far failed to reference the plight of Rohingya Muslims, instead blaming ‘terrorists’ for ‘a huge iceberg of misinformation calculated to create a lot of problems between different countries.’

In a strongly worded letter to Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, Mr Lloyd added: "You will recall similar circumstances in the past, in Kosovo for example or before that in Bosnia, where we saw alleged military action by armed groups used to justify genocidal actions. In both cases this led to intense periods of diplomatic action and a military response by NATO. I am clearly not advocating military action in this case, but I am drawing attention to the seeming lack of international action in the case of the Rohingya.

"I would be grateful to know what action you and this government have taken to bring pressure to bear on authorities within Myanmar. I wish to know what direct communication has been made with Aung San Suu Kyi, the state counsellor, as de facto head of government. I also wish to know what action you have taken at international level with the EU/UN, and whether you have demanded action from the UN Security Council on this issue."